


A Culture, Reclaimed

by IrreverentFangirl



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Earth Kingdom Culture, For Want of a Nail, Gen, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Platonic Female/Male Relationship - Freeform, Tags May Change, air nomad culture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-01
Updated: 2017-03-01
Packaged: 2018-09-27 17:55:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10037246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IrreverentFangirl/pseuds/IrreverentFangirl
Summary: When the Fire Nation attacked the Air Nomads, three from the Eastern Temple managed to escape. Hariti, Jangbu, and Yeshe made their way to a rural Earth Kingdom town and settled down, pretending to be non-benders but determined to remember their culture and help the Avatar if they ever find him.Hariti and Jangbu’s granddaughter, a twenty-year old girl known as Kushala, is the one to finally keep that promise.





	

**Author's Note:**

> i want to make something clear: i don't expect this story to be popular. i am writing and posting this story bc i love avatar and i had an idea where some airbenders lived and one of them, an adult, end up joining the gaang on their adventures. bc while, when i was 7-10, i thought it made perfect sense for a bunch of kids to save the world, the idea makes me vvv uncomfortable as a nineteen y/o. anyways, this story will not be updated regularly and i have no idea how long it will be.

_ Xia He _

Aang looked around Xia He with tears in his eyes. Katara grabbed his thin arm and tugged him into a hug. “Hey, what’s wrong?” she asked. 

Aang rested his head on her shoulder and closed his eyes. “I’ve been here before,” he said. “It’s close to the Eastern Air Temple and it used to have a rich culture of airbenders, earthbenders, and nonbenders. Now look at it - everyone here is poor and I’ve yet to see a single bender. It’s nothing like I remember.” 

Katara sighed and hugged him harder. “I get that it’s hard, Aang. But, hey, you’ve never told me about the Eastern Air Temple!” Aang pulled away from her hug and smiled at her as he wiped away the tears in his eyes. Over his head, Sokka mouthed  _ ‘thank you’  _ to her and she rolled her eyes. She hadn’t distracted Aang because Sokka was allergic to tears, she had done so because she hated to see her friend in pain. 

Aang interrupted her train of thought as he started talking about the Eastern Air Temple, like she had asked him to. “It was one of the two Air Temples for our airbending women - we were encouraged to visit each other, for knowledge’s sake alone, but male Air Nomads could not live in the women’s temples, nor could they live in ours. I had some great friends from this temple, like Rinchen and Yeshe! I only visited maybe three times in my life, but each time was more beautiful than the last.” 

“That sounds amazing, Aang. I wish I could have seen it,” Katara said. 

“I wish you could have seen it too.” 

“You know, if you’re trying to hide your identity, you may want to be more subtle, Avatar,” an unfamiliar woman’s voice said. 

The three companions spun around to face the direction the voice had come from. In the trees stood a tall, slim woman, maybe two decades old, with dark hair bound away from her pleasantly round face, revealing strangely familiar eyes. She was beaming at them, a kindness to her that they had rarely seen since they had begun their journey to the Northern Pole. 

When she made eye contact with Aang, she seemed overwhelmed for a brief moment. “You…really are an airbender,” she whispered, her eyes wide. “I’ve never seen an airbender outside of my family, but you - you’re the real deal.” 

Aang froze as he stared at her, wary hope clear in his expression. “Did you just say you’ve never seen an airbender  _ outside of your family?”  _

The woman beamed and nodded eagerly. “I am Nam-kha, daughter of Nima, daughter of Hariti and Jangbu, siblings in all but blood of Yeshe. Before today, we thought we were the last airbenders.” 

**Author's Note:**

> xia he is an actual name of a real chinese town that is on the border of tibet. foreigners aren't allowed to enter it these days w/o paperwork. i like the name and i like that it's on the edge of china (the earth kingdom) and tibet (the air nomads). 
> 
> nam-kha is a tibetan name that means spacious sky 
> 
> come scream at me on my [tumblr](http://nonbinarydereknurse.tumblr.com/)


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